


Lyre Strings

by PeopleDoCrazyThings



Series: Stories About Love or Death [3]
Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: F/M, Orpheus and Eurydice Myth, aka lots of angst and sappy romance, aphrodite needs to stop, bad parenting as always, but at least this time she kinds means well, except with my weird take on it as per usual with these, it's okay it'll probably be a happy ending, sorta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-22
Updated: 2018-04-01
Packaged: 2019-04-06 17:05:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14061462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PeopleDoCrazyThings/pseuds/PeopleDoCrazyThings
Summary: This is the tale of lyre strings, of flowers, of dreams, of a journey to the depths of hell and the highest heavens, of music, of escape, of friendship, of love, of death, of freedom.This is the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice





	1. Prologue: The Pre-Chorus

# Prologue: The Pre-Chorus

_We are the music makers, we are the dreamers of dreams_

* * *

 

i. The first time we hear of Orpheus is when Thanatos comes to us one afternoon, looking weary. He is always look exhausted these days.“Apollo has a son,” he says, eyes darting around like there's something chasing him. There is always something chasing the god of death, I suppose, and many of them reside in our realm.“Apollo has many sons,” Hades returns, dry.

I reach out and places two fingers under Thanatos’ chin, see the bone-paleness of his skin against the rich red-copper of his eyes and sigh. “You look tired.” Crescent purple bruises are carved deep beneath his eyes.Usually hidden by his scrap of cloth, but today he has forgotten it.    
  
“I haven’t been sleeping. There’s a war in the East, and one in the West, and an epidemic in the South- there are souls for years. I need to go there.”

Hades nods mutely, we both know the dead have been increasing rapidly. There have been thousands of new people in our realm every day. Thanatos and Charon haven’t slept in weeks. Neither has Hades, for that matter.

“Will you be able to stay long enough for the last family dinner before I go?” I ask, Thanatos smiles sadly, but nods. He looks so hopeless, a shell of himself. I pull him into a hug,

“Take care of yourself, Than.” He flinches but squeezes me back tightly.

“I’ll see you two tonight,” he promises before disappearing.

There’s that at least.

Ψ

The second time I hear of Orpheus, it is the last day of spring. I am dressed not in the dark rich colours that name me Queen of the underworld, but a soft lilac that marks me a daughter of spring.

The sun burns brightly on the meadow, Psyche flutters down next to me.

“You weren’t waiting long were you?” she asks softly, offering me something sweet to eat. 

I smile gratefully around a mouthful of cake, “Not at all. Have trouble sneaking away from your husband?”   
  
She snorts. “You've heard me taking off, I do not  _ sneak _ . Besides, he was the one who suggested the visit”   
  
“Yes, You said you had news from  _ my _ husband,”I say slowly, trying not to sound too worried.

  
“About, not from,” she corrects me. “It’s the humans; they’ve been waging war for months. A bloody horrible thing. And there’s an illness that hasn’t been cured- it may never be. Rumor is there’s too much death for your realm. People are saying that the inner court of the Underworld is falling apart under all the stress.”

Gossip is idiotic. Our realm is large and our family is strong, but- my heart clenches. Psyche nudges me with her shoulder.

“Have you heard of Apollo’s son?”

“Apollo has many sons,” I say softly, she laughs at this.

“Well, yes, but this one, oh I forget his name- but he can play music like you’ve never heard….”

She continues on, distracting me best she can from my fears. 

Ψ

I can tell the rumours were true before I even step foot in my palace, and I know it for sure when I enter our bedroom to find Hades half-dressed sitting on the edge of our bed with his head in his hands and a broken vase in the corner.   
  
“How bad is it?” I ask, and he startles, having been so deep in thought he hadn’t noticed me.   
  
“Persephone,” he greets, his whole face going soft as he moves to stand up. I beat him to it and push him gently down onto the bed, I lie down next to him curling into his side, head on his chest. I press a soft kiss onto his skin, his arm curves around my waist, fingers grazing my hipbone. 

“I’ve missed you,” he says softly, a mixture of love and pain. I wait for a moment and he sighs, “it’s worse than you could possibly imagine.”   
  
“We’ll work it out,” I promise as I kiss him slow and sweet, and try not to worry too much about the panic in his voice.   
  
The Underworld survived every war before this, and we’ll survive this one too.

Ψ

Aphrodite enters our realm, her hair piled atop her head and held together with copper pins fashioned in the shape of delicate flowers. “Apollo has a son,” she says, biting her bottom lip.   
Hades and I share a glance before he says, “Apollo has many sons.” 

I feel as if we’ve had this conversation before.

  
She quirks her lips in a half smile, “This one is different. He plays the lyre, he plays it better than his father even. He plays it so well that – that there are rumors that he can sooth any beast to sleep. And,” she adds, even quieter, “Ares himself is soothed by his playing.”

“Why are you telling us this?” I ask coldly. Hades places his hand on top of mine. His eyes reminding me we  _ like  _ Aphrodite, after all.

“Because I know the restlessness of your inner court,” her eyes flicker over to him, “and I want to make amends- for Psyche.”  
  
“We will not kidnap or kill one of Apollo’s sons,” I say. Hades feels compelled to add that we shouldn’t want to either, but I can already tell this is a situation which is quickly going to spiral out of his control, if it hasn’t already.  
  
Aphrodite raises a hand to tuck her hair behind her ear, then lowers it when she realizes her hair is already up. “He loves a mortal girl, Eurydice. If she were to die, he would be beside himself in grief. Enough to take his own life, even.”  
  
“Really,” I say flatly.  
  
Aphrodite continues, “Then he would be a subject of your realm. You could compel him to help your friends, could you not?”  
  
“I have subjects, not slaves,” Hades says, “I cannot make him do anything.”

There is a cough from behind us, Thanatos whispers in Hades ear. He looks at me startled and then turns suspiciously to Aphrodite. “She died not moments ago,” he says slowly.

Aphrodite gives us a wide guileless smile, “how terribly unfortunate. Orpheus must be mourning her terribly; imagine being torn from the one you love so soon.”

Hades glances at me, the pain that lingers between us is tangible. “So send her back to him,” he says.  
  
But my mind whirs with possibility; I lay my hand on his arm, eyes bright. “I have a better idea.”


	2. Part 1: The Verse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> forgot i'd uploaded the start of this, my bad, here's the next part

 

# Part 1: The Verse

_Wandering by lone sea-breakers, and dwelling by desolate streams_

* * *

 

  
  
i. My mornings start like this: Wake up, let the sun pour over me, eat, wander through the forest in search of something more.  
My Afternoons are more varied, sometimes I find something to do, someone to help, and some days I find nothing and after a while I return to my tree.

One day though, one day my time will come and I will finally become something more.

Since I was sprung from the earth I have longed to return, or to move forward. I ache for more than the monotony of what is.  
My soles ache and my soul aches, my heart is an unbound thing- wild and restless and aching aching aching.

Sometimes at night I will run my hands over my back, to see if wings have sprout so as to fly away. But the never do.

I want to explore, to see the oceans, to touch every land mass at once.

I have dreams that repeat themselves night after night. Dreams of forests which leave me restless and tear-stained in the morning. I can see them, the trees misty in a morning fog, a thousand shades of green and the scent of earth, an air like no other. For once I feel no loneliness. A blanket of leaves, a crown of branches, fallen feathers. My fingertips run along moss and bark. Bare feet against moist earth.  
Sometimes there is heavy rain and sometimes bright hot sun. And always, always there are stars when it turns night.  
I will wander through these green-grey grottos and emerge upon the sea. Wind whips my face and salt stings my cheeks. I stare out at the vast untameable expanse- the poets dream, the travellers wings, this heaving churning proof we have always been restless souls.

But I wake each morning, I always do, and the ache returns. So I dream, I dream, I keep dreaming, and wait for the dream to come true.

Ψ

ii. This morning is no different. I wake with tears tracked down my cheeks, and I stretch in the warm sun, replaying every detail to memory, and when the urge to leave becomes too great to bear, I remind myself what could happen if I leave until it desists, and I follow my routine of picking berries and dancing through the woods.

But then I hear it.

It is quiet at first, a soft sweet tune, a voice of nectar and milk joins in, the melody weaves through the woods, but does not stir even a leaf.  
The tempo increases, bursting with joy with hope, I can hear the smile on the the singers face, and the birds join in flying around in a dizzying harmony, and when I think the world may burst burst from such bright energy, it drops away to a slow content pace, that settles on the ground amidst the flowers and shrubbery, growing slower and softer until it sleeps nestled in sunbeams and the spell is broken.

And a man appears from behind a tree.

I shriek, loudly, and stumble back onto the ground, crawling backwards. I know what happened to my sister, I know what men do to nymphs in secluded forests, but the man stares at me apologetically, hands raised, and in his hands- a lyre.

“You played the song?” I ask, torn between running and asking for another.  
“Uh, yes, I did,” he says slowly lowering his hands and sitting down on the earth.He makes no move to come closer to me, even looks apologetic for startling me.  
I pull myself into a calmer position, but retain the distance between us, “will you play another?”  
He smiles, and holds the lyre up strumming softly,  
it is a slower song and it reaches out to me, tasting of oak and the songs of lost travelers. It sounds like the first beat of a heart, the bright gold light of beginnings. I close my eyes and make a wish. The sing knows what it is like to be a dreamer so on fire with longing the pine trees ache at just a glimpse of you. Go on it urges, let go, you are still so young and wild.

The song floats away and so I request another, and another, and another until-  
“That’s it, I have no more songs.’ HE looks down regretfully at his instrument, s though he has hurt its feelings.  
“How can you run out?” I ask, and he smiles sadly.  
“I lost inspiration, I need to find some more,which is why I am travelling through forests and- do you live here?”  
“Yes.”  
“Just you?”  
“Yes.” He waits expectantly, and I find myself wanting to confide in him, so I tell him more, “When I was younger there were many of us living here, but my older sister- she was found by a group of men and..” I shudder at the memory, “I found the body afterward... We- we were all...horrified and..and angry- but mostly scared it would happen again. I had the choice when the rest of my sisters fled this place, to join them in a new forest, but I was too afraid to leave everything I knew behind. And now I am stuck here, and can only leave in my dreams.”

He stares sadly at me, “I’m sorry,” he says softly.  
I make a non-committal noise and gesture to his lyre, “well nothing can be done for me but as for your inspiration, I can think of a many places within this forest that will help you.”  
“Will you show them to me?” he asks hopefully, but I shake my head.  
“You must find them yourself I’m sorry, I barely know you and really cannot see how I would be of use to a songwriter.”

He looks sad for a moment and then, he beams, the smile splitting his face wide and making him suddenly very handsome.  
“Well, I’m Orpheus,” he announces, “and as for the second matter- I’d like to write a song about you.”

Ψ

iii. At first, I think he is joking. A song about me? The nymph who was a coward and now is only free in her dreams? I stand and tell him I don’t like his joke, that he needs to leave the forest now. He follows me at a short distance, begging me to reconsider; he didn’t mean to insult me, he just wants to sing a song about my dreamings.  
This almost makes me stop. In all my years of solitude I have never been able to tell someone about my dreams, never been able to confide in a friend- or even have a friend. But the risks outweigh the rewards- we would know each other only long enough for him to finish his song, then he would leave me with a bitterness of what could have been lingering in my mouth. So I do not stop walking.  
“Look, if you help me write a song about your dream that helps you escape, then I will owe you one favour. You can ask anything of me and I will make it happen.”  
I slow, but do not stop, “anything?” I ask.  
“Anything.” He promises, which is either very brave or very foolish - most definitely the latter -  
I turn, and he almost crashes into me. “My name is Eurydice,” I say finally, his eyes light up, “I will tell you about my dreams and you will owe me one favour.”  
He looks so excited that I almost change my mind, because my favour will not be fair, because I will demand he stays with me forever so I am no longer alone. But he agrees. And we sit down in a clearing.  
“Tell me about your dream.” he says, I almost begin to tell him about the sad ones that wake me each morning with a pain I cannot heal, but he asked for my dream and not my dreams. And perhaps it does not make a difference really, but I tell him of the one good dream I have ever had.

“I am lying on the clouds.” I begin, “the voices of people I once loved float up to me, and I can tell they are happy. It sounds like your first song. I watch the sky turn from the deep blue of night to the rosy pink of sunrise and back again. A blanket of stars keeps me warm, and glowing constellations fill the empty spaces of my heart so that it no longer aches. Rocking me to sleep is the ever-present wind, it’s touch gentler than I could imagine. I have no more fear, or longing, or hurt, only peace. For once in my life, there is only peace.”  
I finish and fold my hands in my lap, I look up to gauge his reaction and see he is crying silently.  
I don’t tell him not to cry, but I do ask him why.

“That is the same dream I had once,” he says, “it's the dream that inspired the song you heard in the woods.”  
“Oh.” I say, then, “well I have more dreams if that doesn’t work-”  
He laughs, but motions for me to go on. So I tell him about the trees, and the stars, and the sea, and the mornings filled with tears.  
The smile drops from his face almost immediately. But it pushes past sad on its way to thoughtful, he begins to ask questions, gets me to repeat phrases, plucks at the lyre strings experimentally.  
Finally he plays out a melody, it sounds so sad. My face crumples. He stops playing and squeezes my hand softly. “It’s going to start sad, but that doesn’t mean it has to end sad.”  
I shake my head softly, because it always ends sadly with me. “I think I have too much broken inside me to be anything but sad.”  
“Hey,” his lifts my chin to meet his gaze, serious and unwavering. “Sadness? It’s a hungry ghost that follows you everyday, but it is a ghost understand? It is nothing more than air and echoes, nothing more. And you are substance and blood, so when it tries to swallow you, fight back. Life gets hard sometimes. I know, Eurydice, look at me, you are not broken beyond repair- you are always capable of mending, you will always mend. You will be happy.”

Tears build up in my eyes, and I try to rub them away.  
"Crying isn't bad Eurydice," he says softly, "there is a deep pain in you, I can't understand how you feel, but I am so so sorry you have had to suffer through this alone- but I'm here now and I think we can help each other." 

I sob then. Loud and wild and unhindered sobs. Orpheus holds me, soothing me. Eventually, the tears stop, and we talk of lighter things, of music mostly. Always music. We fall asleep against a tree. The next morning I show him parts of the forest while he strums his lyre.

Ψ

iv. “My father was Apollo.” Orpheus says one night across the clearing.  
“Was?”  
“It’s a long story,” he sighs. I turn over onto my stomach and prop myself up on my forearms.  
“I’m listening.”  
He laughs at this- the strained half-laugh of someone unsure how to continue on.  
“You don’t have to say anything,” I say, watching how his outline shudders in the dark.  
“I want to,” he says, “I- For the longest time I believed-” his groan is muffled against his hands. I wait for a moment, then wander over to him. He stares up at me, his expression anguished.  
“I’ve never told anyone this- I’ve never even said it aloud to myself.”  
I hum softly, sitting cross-legged next to him. My hand runs through his hair, guiding his head into my lap, I stroke my fingers through his hair, he sighs.  
“For the first few year,s I was raised by King Oeagrus, as his son. I had eight sisters-five older and three younger. My mother is Calliope- one of the muses, and when she visited she would teach me how to sing. One day instead of my mother, the god Apollo visited me. He gifted me my lyre, explained that he was my father, but Zeus had forbade him to claim me and so he had blessed me with music so that we would have each other in that way.” he sighs again, running a hand over his face, “I was amazed that Apollo was my father, I enjoyed his secret visits even more than my mothers. Eventuall,y I convinced both of them that I would have a better life in Olympus, with them. Mother snuck me in, and I lived with the muses, Apollo would come by whenever he was free to teach me more and spend time with me. By the time I was thirteen I was a musical prodigy. Then Zeus heard my music. He traced it to me, realised who I was. He was furious, he cast me out of Olympus, and the King refused to accept me back in his palace. I wandered for a while playing music in exchange for food and bed. At one point I joined the Argonauts.” he grins at my delighted expression, “I saved them from sirens, and journeyed with them for a while- I fell in love with one of them, Calais.” Tears form in his eyes now, “but Zeus, it seemed, was not done punishing me- Heracles, his favoured son, took it upon himself to murder Calais, and his brother Zetes. I fled that night, and I have been running ever since.”

The world is silent.

“Come,” I say finally, pulling him to his feet. “Let’s go pick berries.” Because morning has come and gone and all I want is to scream at the heavens for letting death hurt us over and over and-  
Orpheus, takes my hand in his. “Okay.” he agrees, “let’s go pick some berries.”

We collapse against a tree, baskets full of berries.  
“Let me see what you picked,” I say, laughing at his outraged expression.  
“What? Why? You claimed it wasn’t a competition!”  
“It’s not, I swear,” I try to steal his basket but he holds it out of my reach, “Orpheus!”  
“Eurydice!” he mocks, I roll my eyes.  
“I just want to make sure you haven’t picked any poisonous ones,” I say as he knocks my hands away agin, he relents and hands over the basket, I throw away the extremely poisonous ones, and throw two safe ones straight into my mouth before he can steal the basket back, with an indignant cry. I laugh- I laugh so much around him. I notice that he is staring pensively out at the horizon.

“What are you thinking about?” I ask softly.  
“Music.”  
Always music.  
I sigh, resting my head on his shoulder. “The first time I wrote a song all by myself, the sky was full of fire, I was scared and alone and I heard a bird singing- and I joined in.”  
“What was the song about?” I ask. He smiles softly.  
“It was about learning to give my soul a name that fits.” I stare up at him, my gaze soft. “I- it was about learning how to take the darkest parts of me and make them into something worthwhile.”  
“Oh, Orpheus,” I whisper, he hums sadly, his arm snaking around my waist.  
“I wanted to be able to look at my reflection, see my mother's smile, my father’s eyes, my grandfather’s anger and say ‘there is nothing frightening here.’” he sighs, “I haven’t quite arrived there yet.”  
I twist around, holding his face in my hands, and stare directly into his eyes. “I see you Orpheus, and there is nothing frightening there.” He chuckles waterly, and I press on, “Everything is a work in progress- art, beliefs, knowledge, and yes, even us. We are constantly remaking ourselves, everyday.”  
He smiles, really smiles this time, “and we are all the more beautiful for it,” he says. I grin, and he sucks in his breath.  
“What?”  
“When you smile…” he shakes his head softly, “you’re- you-” I tap his nose with amusement.  
“Correct, I am me.” He laughs, once. His smile fading into something more.  
“You don’t like the gods,” I say quietly, he shakes his head. No, he doesn’t. “Well there is one shrine here, dedicated to Apollo-”  
“Take me.” he says, no hesitation. Because he might not like the gods, but he cannot hate his father.

Ψ

v. We walk silently, his shaking hand clutched tightly in mine. “There,” I whisper, pointing into a glade.  
It’s not particularly ostentatious, a few small pillars and a sun with a hollow centre in the middle. But when the sun rises and sets, it shines directly inside for a few moments.  
Orpheus approaches it slowly. Then, on one knee, pays respect to his father. He stands, nods once, then grabs my hand as we run into the forest.

About halfway in I stop running and start spinning around in a giddy circle, laughing. I race up to him and kiss his cheek, before running off in between trees.

“What are you doing?” he calls after me. Laughter bubbling on his lips as I flit around the bushes.  
I cannot explain with words, I want to say, so look at me; I am weightless, you make my heart light.  
Instead I join in his laughter, as it floats downstream, this kind of freedom is told only in tales of the gods, this kind of freedom is all flower petals and petrichor and soft breezes, and all I want to do is lie down next to him again and count the stars.

He catches up to me, grabbing me and spinning me up in the air. With a practiced ease I scale the tree nearest to us and pull fruit from it. Sliding back down the tree.

Orpheus has wandered over to some berry bushes, he holds up a berry for examination, I confirm it’s safety and he throws it in the air catching it in his mouth with a grin.  
“I know we only went berry-picking yesterday, but it feels as though we’ve been doing this our whole lives,” he muses softly. The berry juice runs down his chin and neck in fading rivulets, his fingers stained pink. He smiles at me, wide and wild and young, and I can almost taste his happiness, it is sticky-sweet, like nectar.  
He bounds over to me, pulling his guitar off his back in one swoop and plunges himself into song.  
And i am transported to somewhere in the forest, where sparrows take flight, their feathers soft as dreaming. I am a stranger, standing before a bubbling river, wingless and wanting all i cannot have- watching as they disappear into the clouds.

The song breaks off, Orpheus stares ahead of me, his expression hesitant, “Do you like it so far?”he asks softly.  
“That’s my song?” I ask. He smiles and shrugs helplessly. I spin around, no sure whether to laugh or cry.  
“It was perfect, it was me.” I finally say. His hands shake on his lyre. He sees my staring and barks out a sad laugh.  
“I’m going to make the ending happy, don’t worry, I want to play songs that don’t end with my hands trembling.”  
I sigh heavily, raising my own shaking fingers “I would like that- for my existence to be more than trembling.”  
He stares at me for a long while, I avoid his searching gaze, and softly he interweaves our fingers together.  
I almost reach up and close the gap between us. But I am too afraid. I am always too afraid.  
He lets go of my fingers, if he is disappointed, I cannot tell.

“I’m going to keep walking,” he says, “work out the rest of this song,”  
I nod, and motion that I’m going to keep picking fruits.

A moment later he softly calls my name, “I’m still here,” I assure him.

“Eurydice!” he calls, a little more urgent this time, I roll my eyes, and head towards his voice.  
“What is so important that I couldn’t admire the flowers a little- oh.”  
_Oh._

Orpheus stands at the edge of the forest, stretched about before him is miles of sand and sea, and stars littering the sky.  
It is true what they say; there is no elixir like the salted waves.  
Orpheus looks over at me, the moonlight reflecting in his smile. His fingers reach up and trace the edge of my face.  
“I want-” He stops suddenly tearing his fingers from my face and through his hair. “Nevermind what I want.”  
His voice is quieter now, and he stares back out at the sea, “what do you want?”

_You. I want to say. Always you_. 

“I want to find peace with myself,” I finally settle on, “to move forward, to blaze in a way that only comets can. I want to hope so fiercely that it is the one tender thing this earth remembers about me when I am gone. And-”

He turns to me, eyes swimming with some unreadable emotion, “And?”

And suddenly the hesitancy, the fear, the waiting for the right moment, it all seems pointless. The gods may have abandoned us mere mortals, or maybe they watch on fondly, but they cannot control us and they cannot determine our fates- everything is a choice, and so I close the distance between us, my lips brushing against his.  
“And you.”  
There is a terrifying pause, our breaths intermingling, then he pulls me into the sand, kissing me like I am air.

 

The next morning I wake to Orpheus lying next to me on his stomach, he dips his hands into the sands, grains sifting through his fingertips like a waterfall in an hourglass. The air is quiet except for bird-wings overhead. I pull myself to my feet, stretching and taking in the sunrise. In daylight, it looks like the sun and sky are shell-swirled brushstrokes. Orpheus comes up behind me arms wrapping around my waist. He brings his lips down to my ear.  
“Race you to the water,” he purrs, then takes off running and laughing at my protesting shrieks as I follow.  
I crash into him, and we fall to the ground in a tangle of limbs and laughter. The water laps around us, we push into a seated position, still entangled in each other. I kiss away the salt-spray from Orpheus’ cheek. Today, chasing the tide feels less like dying and more like coming home.  
“Are you going to finish my song?” I ask, hours later, as we dry under the sun.  
“Maybe…” he hums, his fingers tracing patterns on my skin, “what part should I write here?”  
“Not a sad part,” I say immediately.  
He laughs quietly, “No?”  
“No. The sea is not a sad song, it doesn’t care for weeping.”  
“I can hardly argue with that logic,” he concedes, bringing his head down to kiss me.

“I have the song,” he says, as the sun is setting.  
‘I am not surprised in the least,” I smile, he shrugs unapologetically, “are you going to play it for me?” I press, he kisses my cheek and brings out his lyre.  
“Let me sing you a lullaby about salt,” he says, “About how I learned to swim instead of drown.” And then he plays.

The first notes are soft; I live on a tiny cliff-face encircled by a sea of vastness; ancient vastness, endless vastness, a churning, wild, beautiful vastness.  
The song picks up tempo; day by day I learn how to make these bones my own. In spite of heartaches and setbacks, birds still sing and I still remember love. I understand that I need to keep going, that there is beauty in letting go.  
Finally it slows down again, sweeter; It comes when I least expect it- I dream of the sweet freedom of the bees flying overhead, and I wake with honey in my mouth. Full of the knowledge that my soul has finally, finally, found that for which it has always yearned.

Tears slip down my face as the last note fades into the sky. Orpheus looks at me, a smile that is not so much sad, as understanding.

“It’s not a sad song,” he says, “don’t cry like that.” He wipes away my tears.  
“You’re right, it’s a good lullaby,” I promise, “a lullaby born of survival.”  
He beams at the praise, his lyre swings back onto his back and he sidles closer, wrapping his arms around me.  
“And now that you’ve helped me finish my song…” he looks out at the sea, but I can feel his attention trained on me, “now you can ask for your favour.”  
I suck in my breath sharply; do I make my unreasonable demand? Do I tie him to this forest forever, with me? How long until he would resent me for it?  
“Orpheus...I…”  
He looks at me from the corner of his eye, his body tense and the air thick with tension. I cannot say the words, they stick in my throat, and so I do what I always do.

 

 

I run. 

**Author's Note:**

> a (3) month(s) without uploading she comes back with (more of this greek mythology shpiel) anyways hope you enjoy xoxo


End file.
